 A newly released UK Government military assessment agrees with scientists that environmental tipping points are the biggest cause of societal instability. Water shortage and famine leads to military adventurism and immigration. The World Economic Forum puts environmental concerns at the top of its list of 10-year risk factors. But politicians measure consequences by change in GDP which paradoxically increases after a disaster, due to recovery spending - so they miss the primary cause of problems. Perhaps that's why the report wasn't made public till a freedom of information request forced its release.
Article at: https://news.mongabay.com/2026/02/tipping-points-and-ecosystem-collapse-are-the-real-geopolitical-risk-commentary UK Military Report at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/nature-security-assessment-on-global-biodiversity-loss-ecosystem-collapse-and-national-security
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 A new mathematical proof shows the universe is based on more than mathematical calculations.
Physicist Mir Faizal of the University of British Columbia led a team that not only showed we haven’t yet found a "Theory of Everything": they showed it is impossible. Many have tried to link Einstein’s General & Special Relativity to the mathematics of quantum physics. These accurately describe events in astronomy and events inside an atom, but linking them into a “Theory of Everything" has proved difficult. Faizal’s team point out the failure of string theory and loop quantum gravity etc before proving that all future theories will also fail. They showed that however future theories are created, they'll entail elements that are subject to Gödel's incompleteness theorem, Tarski's 1933 undefinability theorem, or Chaitin's incompleteness theorem. This means they can never be proved computationally. This conclusion means that the universe is based on more than just calculations, and the future cannot be predicted from its present state alone. This prompts the question: If mathematical calculations don't determine exactly what happens in the future, then what (or who) does? Article at https://www.sciencealert.com/physicists-just-ruled-out-the-universe-being-a-simulation and at https://news.ok.ubc.ca/2025/10/30/ubco-study-debunks-the-idea-that-the-universe-is-a-computer-simulation/ Paper at https://arxiv.org/abs/2507.22950  Obesity and gout are due largely to our lack of the gene making uricase, which apes lost so they could get more energy from fruit. Gene editing can restore it, and our body still remembers how to use it.
. Apes need energy for their larger brains while living on a diet of fruit. Losing this gene enabled them to turn fructose (fruit sugar) into fat - which is why ‘energy’ drinks make us obese. We need this energy because our bigger brains use 20% of our total - and we store any excess energy in case of famine. . Gout - arthritis from urate crystals in our joints - affects 1/25 adults. The extra uric acid that we and apes can't metabolise comes mainly from red meat and beer. Apes don't consume these but humans need occasional extra energy to feed our bigger brains. . Perhaps evolution or gene editing will one day fix this, so we don't get obese or gout this. But in the meantime we could eat differently - though this takes more than increased brain power. Article at: htps://www.livescience.com/health/genetics/gene-that-human-ancestors-lost-millions-of-years-ago-could-help-treat-gout Papers at: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-025-10551-8 https://faseb.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1096/fj.13-243634  Wild Orangutans have surprisingly complex language and tool skills.
A study in 2024 focused on the language of the wild Bornean orangutan (Pongo pygmaeus wurmbii), especially in the “long call”. They found two levels of rhythmic hierarchy, which implies recursion. That is, it contained standard elements that were organised into different units, like our words are organised into phrases. Another study of wild female Sumatran orangutans found three levels - as if those phrases were organised into sentences. They only have a few fundamental units, unlike our hundreds of thousands of words. Their language is more like short sections of classical music which has 12 notes organised into phrases which are rearranged into different motifs. Their language also uses different rhythms and speeds for different types of messages. The researchers (Adriano Lameira et al) conjecture they share the neurological structures used for human language and song. They can also use spears for fishing. Chimpanzees have sharpened sticks with their teeth to impale bush babies for food, when they are hiding in holes. But Orangutans have taken this further by attempting to spear moving fish, which they appear to have learned by mimicking humans. Orangutans separated from the hominid line about 15m years ago - about four times our distance from 3.2m year-old Lucy. But like us, they have been changing in the mean time. And it appears they are continuing to learn. Article on language: https://theconversation.com/what-the-hidden-rhythms-of-orangutan-calls-can-tell-us-about-language-new-research-257400 Paper on language: https://elifesciences.org/articles/88348 Article on spearfishing: https://primatology.wordpress.com/2008/04/29/orangutan-photographed-using-tool-as-spear-to-fish/  Most American Evangelicals still don’t believe they share any responsibility for global warming or think it is worth fixing.
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Religious conflicts can obstruct science. A genetics paper has been rejected after peer approval, because the conclusions were perceived as politically biased. It showed the genetic background of Palestinians matched that of ancient Jews. This conclusion is established by at least four other high-quality published studies (links below).
Palestinians are descended from Jews who remained in the land when others dispersed after Rome destroyed Jerusalem in AD 70. When Islamic armies arrived in AD 636, most of them changed religion, but their genes remained Jewish.
This has been reported by Palestinian and Jewish publications, but continued conflict has made these findings inappropriate.
Articles:
Palestinians are descended from Jews who remained in the land when others dispersed after Rome destroyed Jerusalem in AD 70. When Islamic armies arrived in AD 636, most of them changed religion, but their genes remained Jewish.
This has been reported by Palestinian and Jewish publications, but continued conflict has made these findings inappropriate.
Articles:
- Palestinian Centre for Rapprochement:
https://imemc.org/article/the-law-of-return-and-the-zionist-campaign-to-subvert-science/ - Jewish newspaper HaAretz (in English)
https://www.haaretz.com/science-and-health/2015-10-20/ty-article/0000017f-dc0e-df9c-a17f-fe1e57730000
- Human Immunology, 2001 (retracted though it passed peer review)
https://europepmc.org/article/med/11543891 (only the Abstract remains) - American Journal of Human Genetics, 2010:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3032072/ - Nature, 2010:
https://www.nature.com/articles/nature09103.pdf - Journal Human Genetics, 2012:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3543766/ - Genome Biology and Evolution, 2013:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3595026/
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